TRANSCRIPT

Pakistan, where thousands of people remain in desperate need of aid and waters continue to rise.

Jonathan Miller of Independent Television News reports from Sindh

Province in southern Pakistan.

JONATHAN MILLER: Loaded to capacity, the helicopters of the Marine

expeditionary force struck out to the northwest, across the ocean that is Upper Sindh, a water world dotted with islands of misery, farmsteads, villages, entire towns stranded for weeks now, some entirely abandoned, from horizon to horizon, for mile after mile, a vast inland sea, accessible only by chopper.

People in these villages have been marooned for sometimes up to three

weeks, surrounded by a sea of water. This is their first airdrop. You can really understand why they’re so desperate.

Only the hurricane-force downdraft keeps the hungry at bay, as they

surge towards the huge helicopter hovering 20 feet off the ground, unable to touch down. It’s still too marshy below. These isolated villages probably ran out of supplies weeks ago. They have no idea when the next drop is going to come. This is their chance.

One of the choppers finds enough space to land. Local people are held

back at a safe distance. The rice crops are ruined, and the seed crop

destroyed. Ten million Pakistanis will be reliant on food aid for at least another year.

The pilots want to go. Suddenly, everyone bolts towards the stacked

sacks of flour and boxes of high-energy biscuits. They grab and they run. It’s the survival of the fastest. There are winners, and there are losers.

The Americans are throwing tens of thousands of Pakistanis a lifeline.They consider these mercy missions their humanitarian duty, but they know too that they’re buying much-needed goodwill in a fragile, chaotic, and volatile nation.

I see our mission as trying to help people who are starving.I see it as — our mission as trying to alleviate human suffering.That is our mission.If a benefit — if a side benefit of better will, of better relations with Pakistani — people of the Pakistani government, that’s fine.

JONATHAN MILLER: We have heard reports of fresh flooding a few hours’

drive to the south.

As we head down the West Bank of the River Industries, we pass villages

only recently abandoned to the water.Local police insist we take an armed escort.This is bandit country.The policemen in our two vehicles had both lost their homes.Their families now live in camps.

Suddenly, just outside Bhan Saeedabad town, we reach the end of the

road.The newly displaced arrive on dry land with what they could grab.They are stoic, but shock is already turning to depression.Eight feet of water will take months to drain and evaporate.

It’s incredible to think that, nearly two months after the floods first

struck, fresh areas are still being inundated.This whole area here was flooded out within the last couple of days or so, and it wasn’t because there was a huge amount more rain, but because army engineers decided to cut a 70-meter-long breach in a nearby lake which had grown to four times its size.

The trouble was that the protective walls of that lake then crumbled,

allowing all this water to gush out and flood 150 or more villages.

Relief workers are yet to reach this area.They have struggled to keep

pace with the water.We join a group returning to their village.Beside me, in blue, Mohammed Sardar, just back from Karachi to see what the flood had done to his family home.

The government now says 100,000 square kilometers have been flooded

nationwide, nearly 30,000 kilometers of roads submerged, nine million acres of cropland underwater, and 21 million people affected.And that was before this area went under.

Mohammed Sardar wanders around Jadani village in a state of increasingly traumatized disbelief.Some homes remain clear of the water, but half the village has been submerged.

MOHAMMED SARDAR, Pakistan (through translator):The destruction is on

such a scale, it will be impossible to return to normality.These are poor people, and their crops are destroyed.All their savings were invested in their crops, and now they can’t harvest them.They are left with nothing.

NASEEBA KHATOON, Pakistan (through translator):What will my life be

like?I am sitting here in sadness with my children.Nobody is giving me food.I have nothing.All my time is spent in shock, with my children around me.I have no medicine, no food, no water, no sanitation.

JONATHAN MILLER: As its people survey the damage, a gloom is settling

over Pakistan.Few have faith in their government to do much to help.

Politics is in a perilous state.The country is broke.Millions more

people will be condemned to poverty, their future, like that of their nation, mired in uncertainty.

PBS NewsHour allows open commenting for all registered users, and encourages discussion amongst you, our audience. However, if a commenter violates our terms of use or abuses the commenting forum, their comment may go into moderation or be removed entirely. We reserve the right to remove posts that do not follow these basic guidelines: comments must be relevant to the topic of the post; may not include profanity, personal attacks or hate speech; may not promote a business or raise money; may not be spam. Anything you post should be your own work. The PBS NewsHour reserves the right to read on the air and/or publish on its website or in any medium now known or unknown the comments or emails that we receive. By submitting comments, you agree to the PBS Terms of Use and Privacy Policy, which include more details.